Re: chinese dry wall

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> The Florida Dept. of Health report is available for anyone to
> read and it clearly says that levels of three toxic chemicals
> were found in all three Chinese drywall samples at levels many
> times higher than have been reported before, up to 1,000 parts
> per billion which is a harmful level according to Niosh.

I'm not attacking anyone here, just pointing out some facts:

NIOSH does not promulgate standards of health and safety, but
rather advises. They are also notoriously conservative, often
driving values down incredibly low on the precautionary
principle, not on what is known toxicologically or
biologically. Since NIOSH dropped the one hit, one molecule
theoryof carcinogenicity, it would be interetsing to see what
theywould set standards st now. Many of their old numbers were
based on the one-hit model. They now accede to thresholds for
carcinogenic effects.

Be careful when citing them as authorities in these areas.

They are splendid site investigators and hard working scientists
and health and safety professionls, but they do not set exposure
values that are legelly enforceable or adhered to as much as say
ACGIH does. In Industrial Hygiene, ACGIH is the gold standard
currently. That's not to say NIOSH or anyone else knows nothing
(and often their data and ACGIH's is the same), it's simply a
fact that ACGIH currently has the best dataset and updates more
often. NIOSH does not have the resources to keep up, neither
does OSHA.

NIOSH Pocket Guide--Carcinogens